T.S. Eliot’s ‘Sweeney Erect’ Revisited

Abstract

The main goal in writing this paper is to illustrate and shed light on the four main themes of the poem; myth and misogyny, violence and sexuality, self-importance and carelessness, human desire and animality in the poem and how Eliot describes his own preview on modern man and the condition of life which is full incompleteness by presenting this poem. Reading the poem carefully will make that clear that Eliot chose those themes for some reasons; firstly because the modern society suffers from lack of communication and live in an imaginary life and most of them construct a relationship just to quench their whims, not to complete their lives. Eliot believed that modern man is selfish and careless about the main points of building sabbatical life for themselves and others. In his paper, modern man’s problem has been shown on the shape of duplicity, lack of relationship and the effect of poverty on women in society, these problems are depicted by Eliot in “Sweeney Erect”. Moreover, the paper focuses on Eliot’s portrayal of women in the poem and finally through these themes Eliot tells us “Sweeney Erect” is a mirror, in which the condition of modern society is reflected.